


A Silent Parting

by eowynjedi



Category: Final Fantasy, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Echoes of Time
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-14
Updated: 2013-06-14
Packaged: 2017-12-14 22:17:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 327
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/841985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eowynjedi/pseuds/eowynjedi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The hero returns "home" for the last time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Silent Parting

**Author's Note:**

> Another cleaned-up old work originally posted on an FF drabble community.

When she reached the border of the village, she knew something was wrong.

They had told her what would happen, Eryll and the rest. Of course she had known that the vists home were numbered... it had just been a matter of time. They _wanted_ to leave, of course they did. She had been angry at first, seeing how serene they were about the fact that their lives--their existence--were going to come to an end. But in the end, she couldn't be. Two thousand years... and she'd thought it had taken a long time to reach sixteen? Anyone would want a rest.

But they had still been there, the same people she'd known since she could remember. There was the elder trying to give advice nobody listened to, Bachenn snoring on the ground, Toumli stirring her big pot of soup. The charred, rotting ruins of the old village simply hadn't been real compared to that. No matter what they said and how she tried to remind herself, her heart still said that this place was _home_... that it would be here forever.

She stepped out of the trees. The birds didn't stop singing. Insects didn't stop buzzing. But there was still silence. _The cow. The cow is gone._ The yuke-shaped scarecrow stood where it always had, but it watched over nothing. No cow. No Lian and Ilina chatting on the path. No Phelple and Ullz causing a ruckus. It was the same as the day when she had woken up to an empty village... but this time she knew why. Her mouth went dry.

She hadn't even been able to say goodbye.

Sherlotta had strode ahead wordlessly when they'd approached. Now she knew why... she blinked back tears. _I'm sixteen,_ she reminded herself, squaring her shoulders as she walked on. _I can bear this._

_I bet none of the sixteen-year-olds in town had to bear the disappearance of everyone they know,_ said a quieter thought.


End file.
